


Whose Heart is a Safe Harbour

by missmungoe



Series: Shanties for the Weary Voyager [9]
Category: One Piece
Genre: Character Study, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Families of Choice, Fluff, Friendship, Light Angst, Loving Marriage, Motherhood, Personal Growth, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-23
Updated: 2018-02-23
Packaged: 2019-03-21 08:27:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13737027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missmungoe/pseuds/missmungoe
Summary: She's more than a port of call and a parting glass, and even the sea couldn't hope to compete with all that love.Makino, and twelve very different birthdays.





	Whose Heart is a Safe Harbour

**Author's Note:**

> Makino's birthday is the 23rd, and I wanted to write something centred around her, so here's a love letter to my favourite girl.

“Then sail, my fine lady, on the billowing wave -  
The water below is as dark as the grave,  
And maybe you'll sink in your little blue boat -  
It's hope, and hope only, that keeps us afloat.”

Margaret Atwood, _The Penelopiad_

 

* * *

 

_20._

 

She didn’t know who’d told him it was her birthday.

It had never been a big deal. Her late mother had been thrifty in everything, even celebrating, and she’d never made a fuss. There’d be a gift, something simple or practical, and a kiss to her hair on good days. A drink shared between them once she got old enough; two glasses poured after they’d closed up the bar, no more or less, and sending her off to bed, one year older and her stomach warmed with her mother’s best liquor, and the day forgotten by sunrise.

It had never been a big deal. She wasn’t used to being _made_ a big deal.

The rousing chorus of her name greeted her on her way through the doors, the sound of it so startling she very nearly dropped the basket in her hands, and with her heart coming down from where it had careened into her throat, it took her a second to realise that the source of the commotion was the crew of pirates gathered in her bar—the common room that had been empty when she’d walked out less than an hour earlier.

Makino gaped, momentarily too stunned by the sight to make the connection—the date, and the cheerful grins looking back at her. All she could seem to think about was that it was too early for anyone to be up, least of all this particular crew, its captain the most startling surprise of all, seated at the bar and wearing a smile that spelled delight brighter than the tendrils of winter sunlight that had begun to creep through the windows.

“What—” she began, but didn’t know what she was asking, and let the question trail off as she stepped up to where he was sitting. All the tables had been filled and then some, but it was a good hour until she was due to open, and they were never here this early, and certainly not all of them at once.

She looked to Shanks, who’d been asleep in her bed when she’d left him earlier. Awake now, he was seated on one of the barstools, his back to the bar and his elbows on the counter. She’d meant to check up on him when she returned—in what she was belatedly realising had become a dangerously comfortable habit, kissing him awake after her morning routines (and if she’d been efficient, allowing herself a moment to be distracted, the sheets of her bed warm and the naked body in it still more tempting)—but he seemed to have risen of his own volition, his hair damp from a recent wash and his eyes bright and alert.

She meant to ask what was going on, when, “Happy birthday,” Shanks said, the words surprisingly tender compared to the grin that shaped them.

Makino blinked, understanding finding her with a breath, but before she could ask anything else, she’d blurted, “How did you know?”

Shanks cocked his head, expression bemused, no doubt at her reaction. “A little bird told me,” he said, a smile curving his eyes. He hadn’t shaved, the thicker beard offset by the rest of him, which looked rested and well-groomed. “Well, more like an ill-tempered old crow, but she got the message across.”

Makino shook her head, although wasn’t sure if she was disagreeing or doubting his word. A glance at the room yielded an echo of the words he’d greeted her with, from the smiling faces of the crew gathered. They were already drinking, although she only spared the fact a passing thought, still distracted by the reason they were there.

She’d put her basket away, but regretted it now, her hands itching for something to fiddle with, but she didn’t even have her apron at hand. A glance across the room found Yasopp wearing it. Makino decided against asking.

When she looked back at Shanks, a frown had replaced his earlier bemusement, although it was a gentle thing, as she came to stand beside him, trying her best not to fret too much under all the eyes observing her, the sudden centre of attention.

“Why didn’t you tell me your birthday was coming up?” he asked her. It wasn't an accusation, just genuine curiosity, and something she couldn't name—something that sat behind his eyes, that muted gleam that always seemed to suggest he knew more than he was letting on; the one that rooted out secrets from people’s hearts, and kept them.

She shook her head again, suddenly embarrassed—and didn’t rightly know what for. “It’s not a big deal,” she said, reaching up to nervously tuck some of her hair back into her kerchief, suddenly acutely aware that she wasn't used to being the centre of anything, and that she was doing a rather poor job of hiding the fact. “I’m just a year older. It’s nothing worth celebrating.”

Something entered his eyes, a line creasing between his brows, his handsome features pulled into an expression she couldn’t read, although she had that uncanny sense that often came with those looks, that he could see even beyond what was evident on her face, keen eyes looking all the way into her heart, which skipped a beat at the gentle scrutiny.

“It’s the day you were born,” Shanks said then, before his voice dropped into the space between them, the words seeming meant for her alone, as he added with a murmur, “I can’t think of anything more worth celebrating.”

The simple statement caught her breath, and she saw how his smile lifted at the corners, but it wasn’t a self-satisfied smile, just that quietly earnest thing that delighted in catching her off guard, and that made it so easy to forget there was anyone else in the room—that there was anything else in the world, or that there even was a world to bother with beyond the warmth of his body.

She wasn’t given the chance to come up with an answer—if she even could, with her voice trapped and her heart beating like a drum against her ribcage drowning out all her words—as a hand clamped down on her shoulder.

“Happy birthday, Ma-chan!” Yasopp laughed, breaking the spell—shattering that half-enthralled bubble where it had been just the two of them, and while Shanks was quick on the uptake, it took Makino a moment to readjust, the rest of the world crashing down, along with all the noise and celebration in her bar, as Yasopp mused, “How old are you now?”

Still a little flustered from the interruption, and the abrupt realisation that she probably couldn’t have been more obvious if she’d tried, “Twenty,” she managed, with surprising ease despite the still-furious race of her heart.

Yasopp let slip a low whistle. “Damn. And you’re still giving Cap the time of day,” he said, with a nod at Shanks, whose mouth had dropped open at the implied insult. “I hope he’s informed you he’ll be thirty in two years.”

Her cheeks coloured, remembering vividly the conversation they’d had about their difference in ages—or rather, her spectacularly flustered reaction to the eight years that separated them. Shanks did, too, from the insufferably wide grin that had taken up residence on his face.

“The subject has come up,” Makino said at length, studiously ignoring the gathering heat in her cheeks. Then with a look at Yasopp, added, with just a hint of stubborn cheek, “I have all the facts I need.”

That earned her a loud laugh. “You’re lucky she even bothers, Boss,” Yasopp said, grinning. “Pretty doe like her could have her pick. In comparison, you’re like week-old venison.”

“And here I was hoping you were going to go with ‘virile stag’,” Shanks said. Then under his breath, sounding surprisingly hurt, “ _Venison_?”

“Just calling it like I see it, Cap,” Yasopp said.

“Call yourself out while you’re at it, Curly,” Shanks countered. “You’re older than I am.”

“Yeah, but you don’t see me running after girls barely in their twenties,” Yasopp pointed out, with a wink at Makino. “You’re young yet, Ma-chan. You’ve got your best years ahead of you. Plenty of time to see reason, and look for greener pastures.” At the last bit, he tossed a meaningful look at Shanks, who stuck his tongue out as Yasopp retreated back across the room, laughter in his wake.

“He’s right, you know,” Shanks said, and when Makino frowned, shrugged. “You have your best years ahead of you. Can’t say the same for the rest of us. You’ll have your pick, I suspect.”

She had a response ready before she could think—to say that she wasn’t so sure they’d be her best; to answer the hidden implication in his words and say that she didn’t want anyone else, _wouldn’t_ want anyone else for as long as she lived—but stopped herself before she could speak it, realising suddenly that they hadn’t broached that subject yet, of what would happen when they left for good.

It wasn’t up to her to choose someone like him, when he already had his life laid out before him—a life that didn’t include her, and returning to a sleepy little port for no other reason than that. She had no claim to him beyond their occasional visits. There was no future there—at least, Makino hadn’t asked him if there was. She hadn’t dared, for fear that he’d tell her what she already suspected, that although he cared for her, it wasn’t enough; that he was a pirate, and couldn’t give all that up just for a girl in a port, who was so much younger than him.

 _I don’t want anyone but you_ was what she wanted to say, but what she said was, “I think they’ll have a hard time measuring up.” Although from the way his gaze softened, he’d heard it all, but then she hadn’t really tried to hide it.

And what did it matter if he knew? She didn’t want to hide what she felt for him. They were her feelings, like it was her heart to give. Let him know what her choice would have been, if she could have made it—that it would be him, again and again, no matter how many years lay ahead of her, and how many were between them. Makino felt suddenly certain of that, watching Shanks now, seated at her bar like he'd never been meant to be anywhere else. Eight years older than her, maybe, but she didn't think she'd ever cared about a fact less.

She wondered what he thought she would do once he left—if he thought she’d just settle down and find a husband, and live out her life year by year, as though her life could ever be what it might have been before he’d come into it. As though she could be the person she’d been before him—as though she’d want to be.

Makino knew she wouldn’t, but it wasn’t regret that greeted the realisation when it found her. Spinsterhood didn’t scare her; she’d rather be a spinster that settle for less than what she wanted.

She didn’t tell Shanks that, for all that she caught the beginnings of understanding where it alighted in his eyes, although she didn’t know what to make of his reaction—the flicker that almost looked like relief, before he’d blinked it away. And she almost didn’t dare hope that was what it had been—that he wouldn’t want her to settle for anyone else, either.

Someone called for a refill, but when she made to walk behind the counter, Shanks stopped her, catching her hand before she could reach for her tray.

Her protest was soft, and full of laughter when he made to coax her away. “But I need to get to work—”

“We’re at _your_ service today,” he told her patiently, tugging her close, his fingers caged protectively around hers. “We’re even taking shifts.”

As though to punctuate the statement, someone breezed by them, only to begin tapping ale into a glass. Makino could only watch, blinking at what looked like a curiously practiced routine, as though usurping her duties hadn’t even caused a hitch in their usual, easygoing pace.

The large hand wrapped around hers tightened its grip, bringing her attention back, and, “Come on, birthday girl,” Shanks said, grinning a kiss to her temple. “Humour us old men a bit.”

It took some convincing—a bit more protesting on her part, that they didn’t need to make such a big fuss about it, about _her_ —but then there was a glass in her hand, and someone had kicked off a rousing rendition of a dirty shanty in her honour (about a plucky princess who'd dressed as a boy and joined a crew of pirates to escape her impending marriage, but who hadn't fooled the captain, who, having devised a series of trials to expose her in the figurative sense, ended up doing it in a far more literal way, to the princess' delight), and by the end of which she was blushing into the roots of her hair, and trying her best to avoid Shanks' warm-eyed gaze where he observed her from over the rim of his glass. He'd sung all the verses from the captain's perspective solo, in that deep, lovely voice, and all of them directed to her, which had left her unsurprisingly flustered.

The hours sailed by too fast for her to count. Luffy arrived, and promptly wore himself out, but Shanks had already carried him to bed before she could extract herself from the people requesting her attention. There were other well-wishers from the village, showing up to see what all the noise was about, and who stayed, tempted by the welcoming atmosphere and the drinks, and Makino was too distracted by it all to remember that she was supposed to be the one running things. But the drinks were distributed, and the dirty glasses collected, an efficiency in their handling that invoked a busy deck and all posts manned, and that didn’t allow room for her to fret.

And even with their captain holding court, and so many personalities louder than hers under one roof, their focus never strayed, keeping her at the centre. Makino didn't know what to do with all the attention. She'd known this crew for almost a year, and had served them on all their visits, but that was the role she was used to—the barmaid, the silent mediator, slipping in between breaths to collect glasses and plates, occasionally pausing by a table to chat. She knew how to navigate the edges of a crowded room, and the narrow straits between laughter and conversation, unnoticed; she wasn't used to everyone deliberately charting their course around her.

Her affliction didn't go unnoticed, and before she could be overwhelmed, Shanks had whisked her off to one of the tables in the back, a small pocket of privacy sought and claimed—or at least as much as was possible, with his crew. Makino allowed herself to be led by the current, submerged by the warm atmosphere and their laughter, loud where it filled the room, and her.

Someone had just poured her another glass—she’d lost count of how many she’d had so far, the gathering warmth in her belly suggestive of quite a few, although that could also be due to the appraising look she found fleeting her way, and the large hand that never strayed far from the small of her back, or the curve of her knee—when something was put down on the table before her.

She blinked, taking in the heavy leather notebook—perfect for her orders, for her lists—before she lifted her eyes to the person who’d presented it. “Ben, I can’t—”

“It’s a gift,” he cut her off calmly. “It’s common practice to receive gifts on one’s birthday.” The slightest lift of his brows asked if she would turn it down, if she had the heart, and Makino was too stunned by the offering to call him out on his poorly concealed emotional manipulation.

She touched her fingers to the leather cover, impossibly soft under her palm. Practical, but not without thought, its giver taken into consideration. Something chosen specifically with her in mind.

“Thank you, Ben,” Makino murmured, curiously overcome. “It’s beautiful.”

The words were barely out of her mouth before there were more chiming in—the table before her filling up, a whole treasure trove's worth of trinkets and gifts, and she was so shocked by the unprompted offerings, all she could do was stare as they were put before her.

There were books, several wrinkled paperbacks and one bound in leather, inlaid with gold. Not surprising, her proclivities taken into consideration, well-known as they were, but that didn’t make their giving any less significant. And there were other things—an oddly shaped freshwater pearl the colour of a blush, and a bottle of some foreign, amber liquor, the faded label in a language she couldn’t read. A beautiful silk scarf for her hair, slipping like water between her fingers, shades of green and blue bleeding into each other, a lovely mimicry of the colours the sea would take along the Fuschia shore. A small copper monocular, old but newly polished, and just big enough to fit snugly into her palm.

It amounted to more than she’d ever received on all her birthdays put together, and just looking at it—every piece deliberately chosen, for _her_ —she felt her throat closing up. She wasn’t used to receiving gifts, or this kind of cheerful excess, but most of all, she wasn’t used to the realisation that they’d done it for her. All of it—the party, usurping her work, the presents...it was for her.

She palmed a thin silver chain, the anchor dangling from it barely bigger than her fingernail, the delicate shank and crown so fragile she could have bent both in half with a breath. And she’d never been one for jewellery, or any other ornamentation beyond her kerchiefs, but she appreciated the simplicity; nothing ostentatious about it, and so easily missed amidst all the other trinkets and baubles claiming her eye.

She wondered who’d given it. No one had laid claim to it, and they’d all been eager to demonstrate which gift had come from who.

“That’s a decent haul,” Shanks said, and when she looked up it was to find him moving his gaze from the little anchor in her hand, nothing in his expression, although the gleam in his eyes made her pause. “I told them to restrain themselves—said you weren’t a material girl. Looks like they took my advice to heart.”

A startled laugh bubbled out of her, as Makino gestured to the table. “This is _restraint_?”

The look he gave her was affectionate. “I think it’s adorable that you’re surprised. You realise that if they’d had free reign, they might have presented you with a ship of your own, right? And a library to boot. Maybe a very decorative war cannon.”

Makino shook her head. “You’re impossible. All of you.”

His chuckle was low and breathless with delight. “You flatter.”

Shaking her head, she dragged her eyes from the pile on the table, but kept her fingers closed around the anchor, the metal warmed by her skin. The question was on her tongue, to ask if he’d been the one to give it, but she tucked it away, considering Shanks instead, seated on the chair next to hers, dragged so close there was barely any space between them.

It was getting a little hard to breathe. Despite the cold weather, the combined warmth of the bodies in the room wet the glass of the windows, moisture gathering along the frame. Makino felt it across her brow, and the dip of her collar where she’d tugged the high neck of her blouse loose.

Shanks had done the same. His shirt hung open, exposing his chest, the sight of hard muscles and bare skin distracting enough without the extra loose buttons, and she had to stop herself from letting her eyes travel down the length of it, over his washboard stomach, following the thick, dark treasure trail disappearing into the waistline of his pants, below the red sash hanging low on his hips.

“My eyes are up here, you know,” came the rumbling laugh then, and her gaze jumped back up to find him watching her, his grin gratified and his expression wholly knowing. “Not that I don’t appreciate your ogling—you’re endearingly obvious about it. You do an old man’s ego favours.”

She huffed, although she couldn’t hide how flustered that look made her, but, “Not so old that you can’t joke about it,” Makino countered, and felt her heart jump when Shanks threw his head back with a laugh.

“Speaking of my particular vintage,” he said then, tone musing. She felt his hand reach into her hair, the knot of her kerchief loosening, before he’d stolen it, winding the soft fabric between his fingers and across his knuckles. “There are perks of having an older lover. Besides said lover being charmingly rugged. And full of wisdom.”

“Full of something," she murmured, her smile brimming with laughter, and when he gaped, asked, "And perks, is it? You’ll have to enlighten me.”

The clever gleam in his eyes told her she was toeing a dangerous line with her glibness. “You know, I could take that several ways. Are you suggesting that I haven’t already? In which case, I’ve got some remedying to do. Or are you suggesting that I do it _now_? Because you know I’m not hard to ask, and it’s all I’ve been thinking about for the past hour. I'm good to go if you are.”

“All you’ve been thinking about?” she asked, but couldn’t help the pleased flush rising up under her cheeks.

He touched her nose, his fingers still curled around her stolen kerchief. “Well,” Shanks murmured, “ _that_ particular bit is just in the last hour, although you can’t really blame me.” His eyes swept across her face before drifting lower, to the exposed skin at her collar where she'd unbuttoned her blouse. His smile softened, too tender to be convincingly suggestive. “You’re beautiful,” he said, tilting his head to seek her eyes. “Did I tell you this morning?”

“Hmm, all I got out of you was a grunt," Makino said. “You’re delightfully inarticulate before sunrise.”

He grinned. “I can be delightfully inarticulate _after_ sunrise, too, if you’re involved.”

She was blushing so fiercely she was sure the entire room had to know what they were talking about. It was getting increasingly hard to care. “Is that an invitation?”

“A fact,” Shanks said simply; another effortless statement, one among so many she'd lost count. “But it could be an invitation, if you want.” His eyes twinkled. “Although here I was hoping to render _you_ beyond speaking. You are the birthday girl, after all.”

The room was beginning to feel a little too warm, and the way he was looking at her wasn’t helping—of which he was wholly aware, going by the clever lilt to his smile, and the way he kept winding the kerchief between his fingers, seeming to hint at a plan in the making.

“So,” Shanks said then, startling her out of staring at his hands, enraptured by those strong fingers and the sight of her kerchief, now wound around his wrist. She fought to keep her thoughts from drifting to what _that_ suggested. “Good birthday so far?”

It took Makino a second to gather herself, although her breathing was still coming a bit too heavy to pretend at ease, but the truth was still at her fingertips, taking in her crowded bar. “It’s been wonderful,” she said, honestly. Then, with a wry smile and a glance at the table, added, “If a little excessive."

His laughter dropped right into her stomach, a rich and lovely sound, and with an aftertaste that lingered. “Wonderful if excessive,” he recited, and quipped, eyes gleaming as he beheld her, “It’s what I aspire to be, in all aspects of my life.”

She recognised the look on his face as the one he got sometimes—the one that suggested he could look at her forever, and that left her stomach fluttering, and the rest of her tellingly breathless.

“The day isn’t over yet,” Shanks said then, allowing his eyes to roam across the room, and his crew. Someone raised their glass with a _hoot_ , which he returned, grinning.

“No?” Makino asked, and wondered if she sounded as short of breath as she felt. “This is already more than I’m used to.”

He hummed. “Yeah,” he murmured, his smile knowing as he watched her. “I figured it was about time that changed.”

There was a suggestion there that she didn’t know what to do with—the implication that there was more to this than a one-time thing, although she knew there wouldn’t be. However long he remained in her life, however long she had him before he left, it wouldn’t be for one more year. There wouldn’t be another birthday like this.

“Come on,” Shanks said then, the warmth of his fingers engulfing hers. He’d dropped his voice, and the low rumble of it ran like a caress over her skin, to echo with a pang of desire deep in her stomach. “I’ve had to share you all day, and I have my own idea of how to celebrate you. Privately.”

She felt hot all over, watching him, and the promise of exactly what kind of _celebration_ he had in mind kindling his eyes, before settling in the lazy tilt of his sensual mouth, a smile that spoke of giving; a particular kind of generosity she’d become intimately acquainted with, and that she felt with a shiver of anticipation between her legs. She had to concentrate on drawing breath into her lungs.

She saw his gaze shift towards the doors, and the silent question in the quirk of his brows. His ship would be empty, his crew otherwise occupied, and it didn’t take more than a breath for her to decide, finding herself suddenly desperate to touch him, and for the privacy to do it without restraint.

They stole away in the shadow between the noise and the laughter, escaping the heady tumult of her bar and out into the cold night air. It was a shock against her over-warm skin, the briny cut of the sea breeze reaching all the way through her clothes, but it did little to soothe the heat pooling in the bottom of her stomach. The winter sun had long since melted into the sea, the water black where it gathered with ice along the shore, and the shadows ushered them away, keeping her secrets, the rabbit-fast leap of her heart that always wanted to betray her whenever she was near him.

“They’ll notice we’re gone,” Makino said, a glance offered over her shoulder as they made for the docks. Party’s sat behind them, illuminated from within, laughter drifting out into the sleeping village, the muted echo fitting itself between shuttered windows and the winking gleam of the porch lights dotting the sloping path inland.

“They will,” Shanks agreed, calloused fingertips sneaking up her wrist as he tugged her along. He’d left his cloak behind, but fairly exuded warmth. Makino inched a little closer, his large frame offering reprieve from the chill, and familiar protection. “And they’ll try their best not to be too insufferable about it when we return.” At her look, his grin widened. “I’m just stealing you away for a bit—I don’t think I could get away with having you to myself much longer than that, do you know how possessive they’ve become? It’s a little ridiculous.”

“Oh, they’re the possessive ones?” she asked, and laughed as he pulled her close, as though in cheeky retaliation, and offered his answer with a kiss that had her sinking against him, quite forgetting the cold.

Her heart skipped at the small demonstration, the quiet declaration of devotion that she knew was at odds with what was in the cards for them, but that she still accepted, and greedily. She’d take whatever she could have of him, for as long as she still had him.

They’d yet to reach the gangway, his ship looming ahead, a dark creature rising out of the water, her sails rolled up and her masts arching towards the night sky, and no judgement offered to her captain’s tender infidelity. The docks were otherwise quiet, nothing in the shadows but the two of them, and the cold barely fazed her, pressed against the warm frame of his body, his arms wrapped around her and the whole of him hard where she’d moulded herself into him.

It was taking effort to remember that they were still in plain sight, his skin distractingly hot under her hands, the firm shape of his arms and the thick biceps under her small fingers sending warmth sinking below her stomach as she sighed into the kiss, and the hard muscles of his chest pressed to hers coaxed a soft little sound into the quiet.

She felt his grin, before the murmur reached her ears, a telling roughness in his voice this time. “Cabin. Now,” Shanks said, between kisses. “Before I’m tempted to just have you out on deck.”

Her laughter stuttered, but she couldn’t manage a quick enough response, startled by the sudden assault of _that_ image, and his laughter, a low and pleased chuckle that didn’t exactly help redirect her thoughts to safer waters.

Shanks drew back, and with a firm kiss to her mouth, pulled her towards the ship, a familiar, boyish eagerness in his steps that had her laughter falling, soft and breathless where it chased him onto the gangway.

It struck her then, between her laughter and reclaiming her breath, that she couldn’t remember ever being this _happy._ He’d given her so much, himself included, all of it offered in that effortless way he had about him, as though it cost him nothing. Today was no exception, the event deliberately orchestrated for no other reason than because he'd wanted to celebrate her.

She wondered if he knew just how happy he had made her.

“Captain,” she said, gripping his fingers to stop him. Then, quieter, “Shanks.”

He turned his head to meet her eyes, his look inquisitive. He was standing on the gangway, his ship behind him, and watching him from where she still stood on the docks, Makino was suddenly struck with the reminder—the captain she sometimes forgot, but who always lurked under the surface of his easy smiles. She found him in the pensive weight across his scarred brow, and the hard line of his broad shoulders, used to carrying the burden of command. It was impossible not to see it, the regal figure he cut now, betrayed only by the loose buttons of his shirt, rumpled from the grip of her hands, and the eyes taking her in, his focus wholly claimed by her.

“Thank you,” Makino murmured, head ducked to avoid the direct line of his gaze, quailing suddenly with his whole attention on her. She still struggled getting used to it, being the sole point of focus for someone like him, who seemed larger than life. Someone like him wouldn’t usually notice someone like her, let alone demonstrate their preference so thoroughly as he did. “No one’s ever thrown me a birthday party before.”

And it wasn’t just that she was thanking him for, although she didn’t think that had passed him by, from the way his whole countenance seemed to soften.

“Oh, my girl,” Shanks said, the endearment another small demonstration; another thing that was hers, like the smile that followed, wide and adoring. “This is nothing.”

He gave a tug at her hand, pulling her from the docks and onto the gangway, and kissed his widening grin to her crown, the low murmur of his voice holding a promise that sank deeper than the words when he offered them.

“I’ll make it a party you’ll never forget.”

 

 

_21._

 

She didn’t forget. Not the whole year that followed, or the one after that. Not for the rest of her life did she forget the birthday that had for the very first time made her feel _celebrated_.

There was no party, the year after they left. Instead it was just the usual well-wishers stopping by the bar, and a quiet afternoon doing inventory, her fingers shaking around the pen in her grip and her attention fleeting, remembering how it had been, laughing until she couldn’t breathe and his hands never far from touching her.

Blinking away the memories, it was to find herself in the storeroom, the muted shadows safe from the cold sunlight spilling through the windows of the common room outside, although not safe from her own thoughts, stubbornly evading her attempts at redirecting her focus to something that didn’t hurt quite so much.

The ledger Ben had given her rested in her lap, the soft leather wrinkled from a year of use, over half the pages filled with orders and to-do lists. It was strange, the little things that anchored her memory, that reminded her they’d been part of her life, when it was so easy for her doubts to get the better of her, as though the rational part of her mind was unwilling to keep believing that he’d been there—that he’d loved her.

The little anchor lay nestled in the dip of her throat, where she’d kept it for a year. A foolish sentiment, maybe, when he’d never acknowledged that he’d been the giver, and the small suggestion was ridiculous—a silent declaration of devotion to a man she had no claim to, beyond a promise almost a decade away.

Smoothing her hands over the open page, the half-finished list and the ink blotting from her inattention, Makino tried to focus on her orders, but was spared the trouble of failing to keep her concentration by the sound of multiple footsteps on her porch, before the singing whine of her doors being thrown open ushered laughter into her bar—familiar laughter, echoed three-fold, loud and boyish, and, “Makino!” came Luffy’s voice, shrill with excitement, and followed by Ace’s sharp reprimand, telling him there was no need to shriek ("she's not deaf, Luffy, but she might be if you yell any louder").

Rising to her feet and ignoring the ache in her legs from sitting crouched between the shelves, Makino stepped out into the common room to find the boys standing there, Sabo holding a dirty cardboard box, Ace making an exaggerated show of feigning disinterest, and Luffy fairly bouncing with eagerness.

“Hey,” she greeted them, putting down the ledger. “What are you three up to?”

Luffy was tugging on Sabo’s arm. “Show her!”

“What’s this?” she asked, stepping around the bar to see what they’d brought.

Luffy turned towards her, beaming. His cheeks were dirty and the knees of his shorts ripped, Shanks’ straw hat sitting askew on his head, but the grin that met her could have thawed the last remains of the winter cold as he tugged at the box in Sabo’s arms, as though to make him present it.

“Happy birthday, Ma-chan!”

Makino blinked, but when Sabo held the box out with a sheepish grin she accepted it—a soft _oof!_ of surprise escaping at finding it surprisingly heavy, weighing down her arms before she lifted it onto the nearest table.

The box was dirty, seeming rooted out for the explicit purpose of having something to contain whatever was inside rather than for a particularly decorative gift wrapping, but opening it, her hands stilled, and the dirt couldn’t have mattered less, the contents within staring up at her from where they’d been dusted off and stacked with diligent precision.

“Luffy said you like to read,” Ace spoke up, as Makino carefully extracted one of the books, before he cut a sharp look at his brother, as though to suggest where the blame should be directed if it turned out they’d been misinformed.

But Luffy only grinned, secure in his conviction, and Makino caught Ace stealing a surreptitious glance at the box, the serious arrangement of those severe little features not quite succeeding in hiding his anticipation.

“That one’s from me,” Sabo said, pointing to the book in her hands, his smile exposing his missing tooth. It looked of a finer quality than the rest, and she ran her fingers over the ridges in the spine, and the intricately carved letters, the gold leafing long faded. A seafaring tale, and from the binding, it was likely a first edition, but she kept from asking where they’d gotten it, too touched by the gesture to consider the potentially illicit origins of the gift.

The next book she fished out looked older, the leather binding worn but in good condition, supple as butter and wrinkled from many readings. Like prominent laugh-lines at the corners of eyes and mouths, it was always easy to tell when a book had been loved.

Her delight must have shown on her face, because, “I found that one!” Luffy exclaimed then, and proudly.

Ace's mouth dropped open, his careful disinterest slipping right off his face. “What—no you didn’t!”

“Yes, I did.”

“ _I_ found that one. You said that one looked boring because it didn’t have any pictures.”

Luffy crossed his arms and turned his nose up. “I found it!”

"Damn it, Luffy, I was the one who found it!”

“Nuh-uh, I did!”

Makino gathered them both up, her arms around them before the squabble could send them both tumbling to the floor, and they ceased their bickering immediately, seeming too stunned by the gentle interruption to remember they’d been about to pounce on each other.

“Thank you,” she said, hugging them close, the book still clutched in her hand. Drawing back, she considered them both, Luffy’s toothy grin, predictably shameless, and the brilliant blush rising up under Ace’s freckles. Behind them, Sabo was grinning, and she looked at him, too, making sure they were all included when she told them quietly, “I love them. It’s a wonderful gift.”

Ace cleared his throat. “Was just something we found. Wasn’t a big deal or anything.”

“He says, and yet he spent four hours rooting through the junkyard because the first book he found wasn’t good enough,” Sabo quipped. Luffy’s grin widened; Ace looked understandably mortified.

“S-shut up!”

“It had to be perfect,” Sabo informed Makino, cheerfully ignoring his brother’s choked indignation, before he lowered his voice in attempted mimicry, “‘She’s _nice._ She deserves nice things’.”

Ace’s blush had deepened to a spectacular shade of red, but before he could open his mouth to shout, Makino cut in.

“Hey,” she said, fighting to speak past the sob that had knotted together in her throat. Her hands shook around the book, and she clenched them tight, the worn leather soft where it yielded under her fingertips. She needed something to distract herself before she burst into tears. “You know, I was thinking I might bake a birthday cake, but it’s just me and I couldn’t possibly finish all of it by myself…”

She didn’t need to say anything else. Three pairs of eyes widened at the implied offer, and then they were scrambling to offer their assistance in turn, the gift and small, brotherly rivalries forgotten as they bolted for the kitchen, their voices drifting back to where she sat on her knees in the middle of her empty bar, listening ("don't touch the stove, Luffy", "no, put those down—you don't have the best track record with knives", "you can't just decide which cake you want, it's _her_ birthday", "what do you mean _you're_ the favourite?").

It was loud. Not as loud as it had been, not a whole crew to fill her bar and her life, and it wasn’t his laughter, but it was _loud_. Enough that she could breathe again.

“ _Makino_!”

Wiping her tears before they had the chance to fall, Makino pushed to her feet, putting the book back into the box with the others, before making for the kitchen, and the three voices calling her name from within, the syllables brimming with an impatience that had her smile stretching, so wide that for a little while, she forgot that she’d ever been lonely a day in her life.

 

 

_22._

 

Her next birthday was a little easier, the loneliness a lesser burden, resting on a back that was growing increasingly used to carrying it. She didn’t immediately look for comparisons, between the noise that had been and the quiet that was; between the anonymity of her port-town life, and of feeling so thoroughly, wonderfully revered, she’d for a single day felt like the only girl in the world.

Ace and Luffy stopped by for breakfast, Dadan in tow. Her bar filled up, her regulars happy to wish her well, and leaving her extra tips despite her repeated assurance that there was no need; Shanks’ crew had left enough in their wake to see her comfortably settled for the rest of her days if she so wished, but her protests were cheerfully ignored, and she had no choice but to accept, along with the promise that she would treat herself to something nice, for once.

But she didn't know what to do with money, beyond the strictly necessary things. She hadn't been raised to be frivolous, and the trinkets they'd brought her on her twentieth birthday she still didn't know what to do with, the small excess seeming better suited a different girl, someone bolder than her—a pirate, who'd wear silk scarves in her hair and gold rings on her fingers, gemstones dripping from her neck, bared to the sea breeze.

She'd tucked those gifts away, along with the girl they belonged to; had kept only one thing for herself, for the girl she felt she had a greater claim to, steady-hearted and safely moored, and harbouring no conceptions of swashbuckling grandeur, only a single, dearly-held hope.

She hadn’t taken off Shanks' anchor, the simple truth of it seeming an extension of herself; as quietly unassuming and inconspicuous.

Although it had, for all her belief to the contrary, not gone entirely unnoticed.

“You realise that thing’s like a screaming testament of celibacy, right?”

Makino met the old woman’s gaze without flinching, although it took effort not to reach for her throat, and the anchor resting there. “I doubt anyone has analysed it. It’s just a trinket.”

She got a snort for that. “You’d be giving these people too much credit if you believe that.” Her eyes flickered to her neck again, before her mouth quirked upwards. “Good on Red, though.”

“What do you mean by that?” Makino asked. Suzume shrugged.

“Nothing. Smart of him to stake his claim, is all I’m saying. It’s a damn clever way to put off anyone come sniffing. About as subtle as a landslide, but then the man wouldn’t know subtle if it stripped naked in front of him.”

Makino studiously kept her hands busy with the dish-towel. “It’s not a claim.”

“You saying that because it’s what you really believe, or to hide the fact that you like the thought that it is?”

“I—” she stopped, whatever she’d meant to say forgotten.

Suzume grinned. “Yeah. Real _subtle_ , both of you.”

Mouth pursed, although it did little to dispel the rising blush in her cheeks, “Oh—just—stop reading so much into it!”

The self-satisfied cackle chased her into the storeroom, along with the shout of, “Happy birthday, kid! Glad to see the years haven’t weaned you off my charming personality just yet!”

Makino suffocated a groan with her palm, and vowed to distract herself with mindless inventory, at least until her blush went away—it was too much to hope the old woman would, at least while there was still whiskey left in her bar—although it was a feat attempting nonchalance when she couldn’t stop smiling like an idiot, but a few minutes to herself and she managed to walk back out with her chin raised, part stubborn disregard, part quiet defiance, and both more reminiscent of the girl who'd wear silk scarves in her hair, and rings on her fingers.

Makino wore neither, but the anchor stayed where it was, mooring the heart that sometimes fancied she could.

 

 

_23._

 

The year she turned twenty-three, the sea brought more than just an unexpected visitor to her door.

“Garp,” Makino said, smiling. “You didn’t tell me you were coming for a visit.”

She didn’t get an immediate answer. Instead, he observed her from where he stood in the doorway of her bar, his broad-shouldered bulk casting a long shadow across the polished floorboards, the sinking sun at his back marking a rapid descent across the sky, as though eager to escape the creeping cold, although Garp didn’t seem to be bothered with the temperature, clad in a garish purple shirt with an obscene flower print, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows and the neck unbuttoned like it was the height of summer.

He hadn’t caused any undue damage coming in, which was a surprise in and of itself, and he held himself differently, Makino noticed—almost warily, as though he was in the midst of making a decision, although she couldn’t for the life of her conceive what might have him looking like that, his expression somewhere between long-suffering and mildly constipated.

She didn’t point that out, only watched him as he continued idling in her doorway. He had something tucked under his arm—something that looked like a thick folder.

A sigh then, heavy-sounding where it left him, taking his shoulders with it, before Garp finally moved towards the bar, a decision having been made, and, “Happy birthday,” he told her gruffly, placing what he’d been carrying on the counter before her.

Blinking, Makino stared at it. It was a big manila folder, the edges creased and wrinkled from wear. There was an old coffee stain on the front, next to the Government insignia, and a forebodingly large stamp that screamed ‘CLASSIFIED’ in bold, red letters.

Lifting her eyes from the folder, she looked to Garp, a silent question asked with the delicate raise of her brows, but Garp said nothing else, just waited for her to take it, which she did with some reluctance, suddenly worried about what it might be as she unhooked the strap holding it together, before lifting it open to reveal the contents inside.

Her breath caught.

“It ain’t much of a gift,” Garp was saying then, as Makino stared at the wanted poster looking up at her, and the man she hadn’t seen in three years—the breathtaking smile she could barely shape in her memory, sitting with ease on his face, as startlingly handsome as it had been the first time she’d seen it.

The sight kept her breath trapped in her chest, as she touched her fingers to the paper, reclaiming the things she'd forgotten—the angle of his jaw and that high, regal brow, and the laugh-lines at the corners of his eyes, framed by those long, beautiful lashes. The vicious scars bisecting his eye, carving deep grooves into his cheek and brow. He was smiling in the photo, his cheeks curving from it, and she couldn’t decide if it was meant to suggest a challenge or an invitation.

It took her a moment of just looking at him, her gaze hungry to take in everything at once, every half-forgotten feature and detail. The generous curve of his mouth, and the beard that darkened his cheeks. His hair, even redder than she remembered it being, and the laugh that escaped her sounded like a sob, as she gingerly lifted the wanted poster, to peer at the stack of papers beneath.

 _Shanks (M, 30). Alias: Red-Hair._ _Bounty: pending approval._

Her hands shook as she leafed through some of the documents. They all looked official—looked _classified,_ as the stamp on the front suggested, and not even subtly, but she couldn’t seem to conjure the thought to ask what Garp was doing, showing it to her, distracted by what she held in her hands.

Information—dates and locations, and a long, brow-raising list of charges that had something strange swelling behind her ribcage that felt curiously like pride. Brief notes covered the margins of the documents, like the ones he’d left in her books, in her whole life, suggesting affiliations and allegiances, and question marks noting the things they didn’t know.

But in the midst of it all—all the impressions, too many for her to take in at once—one word stood out, seeming to reclaim her focus again and again.

“Emperor?” she asked, glancing up from the document, only to find Garp’s expression painfully enduring, although she didn’t know what that meant.

“Happened recently,” he said. “Although it's not much of a surprise, knowing Red-Hair. Figured he was bound for something like this.”

She didn’t understand the significance, but her hope was fierce, so much that she could barely breathe past it. And it had to show on her face, because Garp’s look softened a bit. Or as much as it could, anyway.

“I don’t know the details of the deal you two made,” he told her then, “but given the kind of enemies he’s racking up in the New World, I hope for his sake he’s keeping you out of it.”

The yearning on her face was probably answer enough, and his expression eased a bit further, as he grumbled, “So I figured you might want to know what he’s been up to.”

There were tears filling her eyes; Makino didn’t even realise until she felt them running down her cheeks.

Scratching the back of his neck, Garp cleared his throat roughly. “I couldn’t figure out what to get you,” he said then, when all she did was look at him. “You’ve got enough books, but I thought this might be—”

She’d thrown her arms around him before he could finish, the folder and the documents trapped between her hands and his back. And it caught him off guard, Makino knew, from the way he stiffened in her arms, but she didn’t care, hands fisting in the ugly shirt as she forcibly suffocated the sob on its way up her throat, her whole body convulsing from it.

But she felt Garp reaching up then, the weight of his hand coming to rest over the crown of her head, and this time she couldn’t have held back the sob if she’d wanted to.

And she couldn’t convey it, the gratitude that had welled up within her, now pouring out unhindered. She couldn’t find the words to tell him how much it meant, just to know that he was _okay_ , and that for all his personal grief with Shanks, Garp had still brought her news—for _her_ sake.

“Would you tell me?” she asked, drawing back to look up at him, the folder held between them, cradled to her chest. She looked at the wanted poster again, and the face grinning back at her. A little older, his hair a little longer. Her heart ached, but she was greedy with it, the sudden need to know. “What does it mean—Emperor?”

Garp sighed, and levelled her with a dry look. “I’m gonna need a drink for this.”

Her smile trembled, fresh tears spilling over, and she saw how the corner of his mouth inched upwards, seeming despite himself. “Coming right up."

Garp glanced at the folder in her hands, teeming with documents, all of them tucked reverently to her chest, and the awkward smile curled into a familiar, suffering grimace.

“You know what, better bring the whole damn bottle while you’re at it—I'm going to need a shot for every single one of his charges, and that's not counting the smarmy bastard up and leaving you." He grumbled, "Couldn't get Sengoku to add it to the official list. Something about personal bias and immediate relevancy. I wasn't listening."

Wiping her eyes with a laugh, "I'll keep them coming," Makino said.

Garp observed her closely for a moment, before he asked, "This isn't going to change how you feel about him, is it?"

She grinned; it hurt her cheeks. "No."

His sigh said enough, but he still moved to take a seat. "Yeah. Thought you might say that."

"You still came," Makino pointed out. It came out sounding like a question.

Garp just looked at her, taking in the hope that had to be evident on her face from two ports away, but, "Yeah," he said, and with a shake of his head that didn't so much spell defeat as something else, something far more tender than that—

"God help me, but the things I'd do for you."

 

 

_24._

 

She didn’t hear anything more in the year that followed, but she kept the folder—kept Shanks' wanted poster, long outdated by now but his smile was the same, wide and shaped from laughter, even if she couldn’t remember the sound. And looking at it, it was almost easy to forget the years that had passed in his absence.

Of course, some things made it impossible to forget.

The doors swinging open made her look up from the glass she’d been polishing, taking in the lanky teenager breezing inside without announcement, before coming to an abrupt halt, and, seeming to realise what he’d done, politely excused himself for the transgression.

Then, his grin widening in that way that promised nothing but trouble, “Happy birthday, Makino-san,” Ace said, stepping up to the bar. And it was a feat sometimes, wrapping her head around the rapid changes that seemed to take place every time she closed her eyes to blink, remembering the foul-tempered little boy whose face had been shaped in almost permanent scowl.

He was smiling now. He was _tall_ now—taller than she was, all too-long limbs attached to a body that was still growing into itself. It was still early in the year, but come summer his skin would be brown with freckles, the clusters especially prominent on his arms and shoulders. He’d grown his hair longer; reddish-black and curling gently, it was swept back from a high brow, one that had used to be furrowed, but that was smoothed with a grin now.

He put something down on the counter before her, and her eyes widened, before they narrowed with gentle reproach.

“Ace,” she said carefully, one brow arched as she considered the bottle of old whiskey—old, _expensive_ whiskey, from the look of it. The only way it could have screamed _loot_ any louder was if he’d pinned a card with the word on it next to the decorative bow wrapped around the neck (and she didn’t even want to know where he’d come by _that_ ).

“What?” Ace asked, grinning. “That’s a good brand. High quality.”

She sighed. “I’m going to pretend you’re not speaking from personal taste.”

“If that makes you feel better.”

She pointed a finger, and tried her best to keep from smiling. It would render her lecture a little obsolete, although she could already feel herself failing. “When did you get so _cheeky_?”

His grin hadn't budged, seeming in direct answer to the question. “Dadan asked me the same thing. Then she muttered something about ‘teenagers’ and went to light herself a cigarette.”

Makino shook her head. “I can’t believe you’re already fifteen.” She frowned, gaze going to his shirt, which looked a good size too small. “Didn’t I just make that for you?”

He glanced down at it, his grin turning sheepish. “Yeah, seems to be happening a lot lately. Dadan threatened to wrap me in a burlap sack until I stopped growing.”

“She might be on to something,” Makino said. “But I’ve got some fabric left over. I’ll make you a new one.”

“Thanks, Makino-san.”

She pursed her mouth fondly. “Just ‘Makino’ is okay, you know,” she said, and saw from the grin he flashed her that his cheek wasn’t restricted to offhand suggestions about his cheerful misbehaviour.

Speaking of which. “Do I even want to know where you got this?” she asked, considering the bottle. It wasn’t quite as old as the one she had shelved behind her—the one Shanks had brought her years ago, her late mother’s favourite that she couldn’t bring herself to touch—but it wasn’t anything to scoff at.

Ace’s grin hadn’t lessened. “Probably not.”

She shook her head, but pulled out two glasses from her cupboard, the look she gave him a delicate warning that he better not let slip to Dadan that she was sneaking him drinks behind her back, before she poured them each a fingerwidth. The honey-brown liquid swirled against the crystal, the colour warmer than the winter sun piercing the windows.

She pushed one towards him, and tipped her own against her lips, tasting the sharp kiss, and the smile it left. Whiskey always reminded her of Shanks.

As though he somehow knew where her thoughts had gone, “I’m gonna find Red-Hair,” Ace said then, and Makino blinked, startled. “When I leave,” he elaborated, catching her look, although she already knew of his plans—had helped him, years ago now, to practice improving his manners for that very occasion.

But there was something else on his face now as he beheld her, something other than the stubborn defiance of the ten-year-old who’d endured her lessons, and who’d had little mind to spare anyone but himself, in the way of children.

Now he was looking at her as though he’d come to some sort of realisation, and so it wasn’t all that surprising when he asked her, calmly, “You love him, right?”

Makino put down her glass, the gentle _thunk_ against the polished countertop stirring the sudden quiet, but, “Yeah,” she said at length. “How did you know?”

He looked at her, his expression keenly understanding. “People talk.”

Her sigh held no surprise; not at the way he’d found out, or why he understood. If anyone had had to endure gossip on this island, it was the boy sitting across from her. The rumours circulating around her were kind in comparison. “They do that,” she said.

“Doesn’t it bother you?” Ace asked then, and thinking he meant the gossip, Makino was surprised when he added, quietly, “That he left?”

She looked at him. And it wasn’t as simple a question as he would have it be, she knew, recognising that he was asking about more than just her feelings—that he was asking about more than just Shanks.

“I don’t hold it against him,” Makino said. The truth, because she never had. “But I miss him,” she admitted. Another truth, and one that never really got any easier to bear. “It’s—hard, some days.”

Ace considered the dregs at the bottom of his glass, his brow furrowed. Makino wondered if he was thinking about his mother. They talked about her sometimes. She didn’t know much, other than what Garp had let slip, and what Ace himself had told her. Her name had been Rouge. She’d had freckles.

“You don’t think it was selfish?” Ace asked then, looking up to meet her eyes. “Leaving you?”

“It would have been selfish to ask him to stay,” Makino countered gently.

“But he chose to leave. Even when he knew you didn’t want him to.”

Makino considered him, and all at once, the years bled away, the awkwardly long limbs seeming very much that, and the expression on his face more reminiscent of the little boy he’d been than the man he was so quickly becoming. And she heard his rebuttal for what it was; heard the question he was trying very hard to hide in it.

She didn’t know what it had been like, between his parents—if their arrangement had been similar. Perhaps Gold Roger had imagined it once; a future beyond piracy with the family he’d left behind, whether he’d intended to or not.

But whatever his intentions, the woman who’d given him a son would have known what choice she’d made, Makino thought. She couldn’t imagine anything else. Not for the woman who’d loved the Pirate King.

“It’s not that simple,” she said, and when Ace frowned, explained, “Love isn’t selfish. I couldn’t have forced him to stay any more than he could have forced me to leave with him. You have to let people choose, even if you love them. Especially then.”

She saw that his frown had deepened, considering her words, but saying them out loud had lifted her heart a little, and so with a smile, she said, “But love is also about compromise.” And, suddenly emboldened by the thought, she added, perhaps more to herself than anything else, “We made a compromise.”

She saw his smile lifting a bit, easing the frown from his features. “Ten years, right? That’s what Dadan said.”

Makino nodded, and said, curiously bold, “I’m holding him to that.”

Ace looked at her. And even too tall for words and with that high, regal brow, he looked very much a boy then, something acutely vulnerable in the eyes looking back at her from across the counter, the empty tumbler cupped between freckled, long-fingered hands.

“You think my old man would have chosen her?” Ace asked then, quietly. “My mother. Even when he had everything in the world?”

The question rang a little too close to home. And he wasn’t asking about her, or about Shanks, but Makino couldn’t help hearing the hollow echo of the question within her; the one she was still afraid of hoping for too much. That he would choose her, when all was said and done.

But she thought then, of the day they’d said goodbye, the rough cradle of his fingers and her hand pressed to his heart. _You’ll take care of what I left you._

She was quiet a moment, considering the glass in front of her, the pale drops of whiskey gathered at the bottom and the aftertaste fading on her tongue; like her memories, each year a little more diluted, a little harder to grasp.

“I think,” she said then, choosing her words with care, plucked from the little knowledge she had, and the things in her own heart, “that there’s a very good reason you’re here, on this island. He wanted to keep you safe.” Garp had told her that much. “Your mother wanted that, too.” That she’d gathered for herself; a strange sense of kinship to a woman she’d never met. “I can’t say what your father would have done, had things turned out differently, but they made a choice. They chose _you_.”

Ace looked up at that, before dropping his eyes back into his empty glass. It probably wasn’t the answer he’d sought, but it was all she had to give. And maybe he had to figure out for himself what he wanted to believe; Makino couldn’t make him, and she knew firsthand how difficult it was, believing that you were someone’s choice—that you were someone worth choosing.

“I could bring him a message from you,” Ace said then, making her look up, surprised. The corner of his mouth lifted a little, no doubt at the look on her face. “Red-Hair.”

She couldn’t summon her voice to answer, caught off guard by the offer—and the implication. A chance for her to bridge the gap, the seas and the years that lay behind her as vast as the ones that loomed ahead. And it wasn’t an explicit birthday gift, like the pilfered bottle of whiskey, but it felt like a gift all the same, and from the way Ace’s smile widened, he seemed pleased to have thought of it.

“I would like that,” she said, when she’d finally located her voice, and didn’t care that it broke upon speaking.

“What do you want me to tell him?”

Oh, that was a dangerous question. Dangerous, because the answer was _everything_. She wanted to tell him that she missed him, that her life was too quiet without him. She wanted to tell him that she still hoped he’d come back—that it was taking everything she had to hold on to that hope, and that every year it got a little harder.

But thinking it, all the truths she’d been hoarding for years, she paused. She had no way of knowing if he still felt the same, or if his life felt like hers, as though it was missing a piece. If he didn’t, relaying a message like that wouldn’t just make her look foolish, it could make him feel guilty. And she’d rather say nothing than become an obligation—someone he had to return to because he felt like he owed her.

She wondered sometimes if he thought the same—if he ever feared that her feelings for him had changed. And it didn’t come naturally to her, considering those thoughts, considering herself as someone to be _wanted,_ and longed-for. Shanks was the one who’d first made her feel like that, and who’d left a stubborn remnant in her heart, that now resisted the suggestion that she wasn’t.

There were a lot of things she could tell him, things she would tell him if he came back. And she had to believe that he would—that he would choose her.

And if there was any doubt on his side as to whether or not she still wanted him to…

Fiddling with the anchor resting in the dip of her throat, Makino smiled. He’d recognise the sentiment; the open-ended offer, and the freedom to take it for what it was.

“Tell him I said ‘hello’.”

 

 

 _25_.

 

The year she turned twenty-five, at the half-way point of their ten year promise, when it was just as hard to give up as it was to keep believing, she poured herself a glass of whiskey and thought of him; a fingerwidth for each year still left to hope.

And tossing it back, chose to hope all over again.

 

 

_26._

 

The year she turned twenty-six brought the unforgiving reminder that although she’d made her peace with her choices, the same couldn’t be said for everyone else.

“ _Marry_ you?”

She realised belatedly that she was gaping, and snapped her mouth shut, although it was too late, going by the blotchy redness in his cheeks. And she would have called it embarrassment, if not for the tight press of his lips.

To say the offer had come out of the blue would be a gross understatement, and she’d never handled surprise gracefully—couldn’t hide her feelings if her life depended on it, and where someone else might have mustered a convincing show of consideration before politely rejecting the offer, all Makino had been able to do was balk.

“It’s a good offer,” he said, defensive, before he straightened his shoulders, as though to shrug off something uncomfortable. Makino had the distinct impression he’d expected her to react differently.

She was scrambling for a response—anything that didn’t blatantly demonstrate that the thought had never once crossed her mind, even as it was the truth. He was a childhood friend; they’d known each other for years, had gone to school together when they were children. He’d been one of her regulars ever since she’d taken over the bar, but there’d never even been the suggestion of anything else between them. At least Makino hadn’t thought so.

She was quickly realising she might be the only one who’d thought that, from the look on his face, and felt the guilt where it seized her. She was on good terms with all her patrons, but had she miscalculated the reception of her offered friendship so drastically as _this_?

“I’m very flattered,” she began, desperately searching for the right words, something that wouldn’t make things worse, “but I’m just—I’m just not looking to settle down right now.”

It rang hollowly even to her own ears, and she tried not to wince. The winter flowers he’d brought her stared back at her from where he’d put them down on the countertop earlier. She’d been pleasantly surprised by the gift, but they seemed to be mocking her obliviousness now.

 _You_ , they sneered, evergreens choking a thick cluster of marigolds. _How blind could you be? How self-centred?_

Disappointment was written all over his face, along with something else that made her stomach knot together, but not with guilt this time, as his expression darkened, and, “Right now, or ever?” he asked, cocking his head to the side, a show of poorly feigned consideration. “Or just not with someone like me?”

“Please,” Makino said, gently. “It’s not—it doesn’t have anything to do with you.”

He scoffed at that, and she flinched, even as there was a part of her that wanted to protest—to say that it wasn’t fair springing something like this on her without taking into account that she might not react the way he’d hoped she would.

“No,” he agreed, watching her from under deeply furrowed brows. “That’s the problem, I guess.” And before she could say anything else, he’d turned and made for the doors, although he paused before he could push through them.

Glancing over his shoulder, “You know, you’re not getting any younger,” he said then, and she blinked, taken aback by the unprovoked comment, but before she could even respond, he’d forged on, “You might want to reconsider being so cold. It’s not just anyone who’d take someone like you.”

She could barely wrap her head around what he was _saying._ “Someone like—”

He fixed her with an unimpressed stare, the curl of his lip suggestive enough of his thoughts, without the verbal confirmation when he offered it. “A pirate’s whore.”

Everything stilled within her. Her confusion ground to a halt, her burgeoning guilt snuffed out like a guttering candle flame. The words seemed to linger on the air, loud where they clanged in the hollow quiet of her otherwise empty bar.

Seeming pleased by her reaction this time, “It’s all you’ll ever be,” he told her, and made to walk out when he stopped, arrested.

Dadan stood there, her considerable bulk blocking the whole doorway, the winter sun throwing her shadow large and foreboding across the floorboards.

Sensing the sudden intent in the air, Makino was moving around the bar. “Dadan—”

She’d seized the front of his shirt before Makino could get the rest of her protest out, and lifting him clean off his feet, “You so much as think about setting foot across this threshold again,” Dadan told him calmly, the rasp of her voice a terrible thing, “and I’ll feed you to the sea king. Limb by limb. I hear it’s got a taste for it.”

Then, her full mouth hardening, a thin, unforgiving line, “Or worse,” she said, before her eyes narrowed, her whole countenance darkening with a sudden promise, “I’ll give you to Garp.”

Paling at the threat, he was wiggling in her grip, but the resistance barely seemed to faze Dadan. With a perfunctory glance at Makino, she’d turned and shoved past the bat-wing doors, striding out onto the porch and into the street. Makino caught the terrified yelp, and the sound of a body hitting the dirt, the furious scramble followed by the sound of running feet.

The softer whine of the doors announced Dadan’s reentry, before she stopped just beyond the threshold, taking Makino in where she stood in the middle of the room.

Lips pressed together with something that looked like regret, “Should I have tossed him in the bay?” Dadan asked. “I could still catch him.”

The laugh that blurted out of her was thick with the tears she’d let fall without realising. “I think that was effective enough.” Watching Dadan’s gaze shift to the tear-tracks on her cheeks, Makino reached up to scrub them away, even knowing the futility of the gesture. It wasn’t like she could hide what she felt. “I doubt he’ll be coming back," she said.

She got a snort for that. “Good fucking riddance.” Then, her brow furrowing, but with concern this time, “You okay?”

Makino nodded. “Yeah. Just—a little shaken.” And tired, a rush of sudden lethargy that made her feel like sitting down.

Dadan let slip a grunt of acknowledgement, watching as she sank into the nearest chair. “Can’t say I blame you. The thought of being that guy’s wife makes the damn sea king seem like the preferable option.”

The smile came wholly despite herself, even as she said, a little ruefully, “Not everyone would agree.”

Dadan just shrugged. “To hell with their opinion. I don’t see why they should have one in the first place.”

Makino said nothing to that, the agreement implied, although she knew it wouldn’t change the fact that people would keep having opinions on how she lived her life. It wasn’t so much that it was unusual to be unmarried at twenty-six; she knew it was the knowledge that she intended to remain that way that raised brows. They’d all witnessed what had happened to her mother, and Makino didn’t blame them for their skepticism, when she’d wilfully chosen the same fate. Their concern came from a good place; it just didn’t always manifest in the best way.

She fiddled with the anchor. It felt suddenly heavier than it should, although she didn’t know if that was her imagination playing tricks—if she wanted it to feel that way, to be more than what it was. It wasn’t a wedding ring, and anything beyond being a pretty gift, she’d ascribed it herself. She wasn’t anyone’s wife—wasn’t anyone’s anything, and wasn’t likely to be, going by her unsolicited suitor’s reaction.

She wondered distantly if she should care more about that, but couldn’t seem to make herself feel appropriately remorseful. She didn’t want to be just anyone’s wife. If she was going to be a wife at all, she’d already decided whose it would be.

The flicker of stubborn defiance felt good—felt better than her guilt. They could call her whatever they pleased, it wouldn’t change how she felt, or the choice she’d made.

“Were you ever married, Dadan?”

Dadan snorted, but didn’t seem offended by the question—just the concept. “Not even close.” Then, seeming to consider the thought, and Makino where she sat, slumped in the chair, “But I’ve been around a bit,” she amended, and with a dry lilt that would have put Ben out of business, “I’ve got some appropriately _whorish_ stories for you, if you’re interested,” she drawled, and Makino surprised herself by blurting a laugh.

“Drink?” Dadan asked then, and Makino sighed, accepting everything the stark question implied—company without a caveat of pity, however well-meant, but more than anything else, the silent assurance of no judgement.

“ _God_ , yes.”

 

 

_27._

 

The following year, there were no suitors at her door. A small blessing, but then Dadan’s threat of meticulous dismemberment and Garp—and not necessarily in that order—had been effective. It hadn’t stopped them gossiping, or kept them from quietly (and not-so-quietly, in the case of certain parties) lamenting her self-imposed spinsterhood, but by this time, Makino had reached the point where she was just too old to care.

The morning of her birthday stirred her awake, brisk and cold and with frost-flowers on the windows, the lace like a wedding veil along the glass, obscuring the view of the sea beyond. And she didn't usually linger in bed, but maybe it was because she was getting old that she allowed herself a few extra minutes under the warm covers, staring up at the ceiling of her bedroom, quietly mapping out her life in the silence, as she would her daily chores.

Twenty, when she’d known nothing of what choosing him would bring her, and had chosen him anyway. Twenty-one, when she’d first begun to realise what that choice meant for her. Twenty-five, when she’d made her peace with it. Twenty-six, when she’d defended it.

Twenty-seven now, and the significance wasn’t lost, thinking of Shanks, and back across the years to the girl she’d been, her mother recently buried and the bar in her keeping, and no one to set her course for her. Eight years between then and now, as it had been between their ages back then, and it seemed suddenly an incredible difference, far more than it had when she’d been nineteen.

Shanks would be thirty-five this year; their age gap didn’t seem quite so great in that direction, when she was just three years away from thirty. But how young he must have found her back then—and how _naive_. Makino found it hard to believe he’d even bothered, but whatever he'd felt, he’d never treated her like a child—or like she’d been older than she’d been in truth. He’d only ever treated her as she was, and had never held her naivety against her, for all that it must have been painfully evident.

She missed him then, and fiercely—so much that she almost considered spending her birthday in bed, if only to stay under the spell offered by the warmth of her covers, and the often-sought if nearly forgotten memories of kissing him awake. The toned muscles under her hands and the weight of his body pinning her to the mattress, and the teasing scrape of his beard against her skin, the warm rumble of his laughter between her legs…

She got started on her morning routines an hour later than usual, cheeks flushed with the lingering afterthought of him, and a sated ease that left her chores half-remembered and sloppy, her hands pausing on a glass she’d polished three times already, and her mind seas away.

Luffy stopped by for breakfast—thankfully alone, and thankfully oblivious to the evidence Makino couldn’t successfully will out of her loose-limbed posture, however much she tried.

He talked about Ace, who’d set out to sea, and there was a barely-contained eagerness in his voice as he talked that left an ache in her heart, knowing that it wouldn’t be long until he was set to follow suit—when there’d be one less visitor on her birthday, and a little less noise in her bar. How much longer until it was just her left?

Willing the intrusive thoughts into retreating, she focused her mind on the present, determined not to welcome loneliness into her establishment prematurely. Not while she wasn’t alone.

“Here,” Makino said, slipping the word into one of Luffy’s rare pauses for breath, nudging a glass towards him. It was the bottle Ace had given her for her birthday some years earlier, but he wasn’t there for her to sneak him a glass this year. “Share a birthday drink with me?”

Luffy peered down at the offering, before flicking his eyes up to hers. “Dadan will be mad,” he told her, but accepted the drink with a grin that delighted in little mischiefs, lifting the glass to his lips without even pausing to ask what was in it. Makino was about to warn him, but he’d already tossed it back, and the warning died on her tongue the second his rubbery features contorted into an impressive grimace.

“ _Ew_!”

Makino laughed. “It’s whiskey, Luffy,” she sighed, the sound desperately fond. “You’re not supposed to chug it!”

Grimace still in place, although it looked distinctly accusatory now, Luffy narrowed his eyes at the glass. “Who would drink this? It’s _gross_.”

Mouth pursed with a clever smile, Makino hummed. “Shanks likes it,” she said mildly, and made a show of considering her own glass.

Luffy stared at her, before dropping his gaze to the bottle between them. Then, holding out his empty tumbler, deadpanned, “I want another one.”

She feigned an innocent look. “I thought you said it was gross.”

He just proffered the glass again, and she shook her head, lifting the bottle out of reach when he made to grab for it. “You can drink all the whiskey you want when you’re old enough,” she told him at the sight of his pout (and kept from glibly adding that if he wanted to emulate Shanks, he was doing a pretty good job just with that). “When you’ve conquered the sea, you can come back home, and I’ll pour you a glass to celebrate. The best whiskey I’ve got.”

He seemed mollified by the offer, and Makino turned back to fetch a clean dish-towel, sparing a fleeting glance at the bottle that sat on her highest shelf; the one that had been sitting there for seven years, still unopened. Shanks had told her to save it for a special occasion, and she’d long since made her peace with the fact that she had one very specific occasion in mind.

And she usually shied away from the thought that it would never come to pass, and that the bottle would remain unopened on her shelf for the rest of her life, but listening to Luffy rubbing his fingertip along the rim of his tumbler, snickering at the shrill melody, Makino allowed it to find her, a different alternative presenting itself.

She looked up at the bottle; the amber liquid that caught and held the sunlight. And she decided then, that if he didn’t come back, she wouldn’t leave it unopened. Shanks had always lamented good liquor going to waste by being hoarded on shelves without a purpose, and it seemed wrong leaving it to that fate, even if he never returned to share it with her.

But remembering that quiet pride that had delighted in the antics of a loud little boy, she didn’t think he’d mind her sharing it with the king of the sea instead.

“Hey, Ma-chan?”

“Hmm?”

She turned to find Luffy fiddling with his empty glass. Not a king yet, and there was some comfort in that, she thought, if a little selfishly.

“You were friends,” Luffy said then. “You and Shanks.”

It took effort not to smile at the innocent statement, remembering his brother, not much older but shrewdly discerning a rather different truth. And it wasn't the only difference between them, but the thought only made her happy, watching Luffy now. Children grew into their own like sprigs in an unruly garden, irrespective of what anyone had to say about it, and there was something fiercely reassuring about the fact, Makino found.

And so, “Yes,” she said. Not a lie, although it didn’t come close to the full truth, but there was something about that cheerful innocence that she felt like preserving, if only for a little while longer. “We were that.”

Luffy nodded, as though to himself. “He liked you.”

She didn’t think she could have held back from smiling now if she’d tried, but it only prompted Luffy’s own, as though happy his words had made her happy. “Oh yeah?” she asked, leaning her elbows on the counter. “Did he tell you that?”

He shrugged. “I could tell.”

Makino tilted her head. “Captain liked everyone,” she pointed out.

“Yeah, but you’re special,” Luffy countered, not a beat missed. And it wasn’t a rebuttal, just a simple fact; a truth that hadn’t even paused for breath. “I think he liked you the best.”

If she'd had a clever comeback ready, she forgot it, although even if she’d had the words at hand, Makino didn't think she could have spoken them past the tears pushing up her throat.

Happily unawares of what his words had rooted up within her, Luffy held out his glass again, his smile cheeky and without shame. “Can I have another one?”

She laughed, the sound startlingly loud. And it took something with it when it left her, leaving her chest feeling curiously light, as though she’d bottled up more than just old whiskey, but she couldn’t find her doubt when she looked for it now, watching Luffy’s grinning face, and that simple, effortless truth that resonated with a barely-remembered hope within her.

_I think he liked you the best._

“I can’t send you home to Dadan tipsy,” Makino told him, clearing her throat when she heard how hoarse her voice sounded, and the tears that trembled in it. “I’m making you something to eat first, so you don’t toss it back on an empty stomach.”

His grin outshone the sun, and when she turned back for the kitchen she was quick to wipe the tears from her eyes so he wouldn’t see, although the smile that broke across her face she didn’t bother hiding, or even trying to.

 

 

_28._

 

“You really think she’s set on waiting?”

“Seems like. She hasn’t made any attempts to settle down.”

“Such a shame. A girl that lovely, nearly thirty and still unmarried. She’s following in her old mother’s footsteps alright.”

“Terrible waste. And for a pirate, of all things.”

“Oh, but not just any pirate. Red-Hair isn’t just small fry, you know. Some say he’s on par with Whitebeard.”

“Oh _really_?”

“What is she thinking—that a man with that much power will come back to East Blue for a girl he left years ago? Honestly. She’s a little naive, our Makino.”

The quiet of her bar was a desperate welcome, the murmurs in her wake cut off by the familiar whine of the doors, left swinging behind her.

It was still early, an hour until she was due to open, enough time to get ahead of her chores, but she ignored the little obligations waiting for her, making across the common room for the staircase, suddenly defiant.

Her bedroom greeted her as she’d left it, her bed neatly made, nothing amiss or out of place. Makino took a moment just to stare at it, an uncluttered tableau of small privacies, found in the things that were hers; the silk dressing gown and the well-thumbed books, stacked with precision. The carefully folded kerchiefs, and the shoes sitting primly beside her vanity.

It was all her. There was no evidence of anyone else ever having set foot inside, but then she’d never welcomed anyone into this part of her life—to this part of _her_. Not since Shanks. And it had never struck her quite so hard, just how solitary it all seemed. A glaring, unapologetic testimony of loneliness.

And oh, but she was lonely—she was so desperately, achingly _lonely_ , Makino thought she wouldn’t be able to bear it a moment longer, like her skin was growing too tight, and the quiet so profound it seemed loud in her ears, grinding against her skull. And quite suddenly, all the things that had her whole life offered comfort seemed _wrong_. There was no clutter, and there had been, once—his shirt on the floor, and the silver-edged razor that she’d used to help him shave, sitting on her vanity. The red sash that had dangled from her headboard, cheekily repurposed and forgotten between lazy morning kisses.

Shanks had left evidence—signs of having been there, of having made himself comfortable in her space and in her life. Makino realised with a sudden panic that there was nothing left.

Suddenly desperate—for what, she wasn’t exactly sure, but didn’t really stop to think—she was pulling out the box she’d kept under her bed, almost ripping off the lid in her hurry, seeking the little treasures she’d hidden away. The tiny copper monocular, and the freshwater pearl. The blue silk scarf that slipped like water between her fingers. The leather-bound ledger Ben had given her, filled with her handwriting from cover to cover.

The acute longing felt a little easier to bear, sitting there on her knees, surrounded by her meagre hoard, even as it was a momentary relief. She felt suddenly tired—and a little ridiculous.

“Happy birthday,” she murmured, and when she pressed the heel of her hand to her brow, let slip a rough, sobbing laugh.

She considered taking the anchor off, to put it with the rest of the memories she’d kept tucked away and out of sight—to let it become one and the same, something to remind her of what had been, not of how she wanted things to be. It wasn’t an assurance; it had never been that, in all the years she’d stubbornly kept wearing it, and hoped.

But hope wasn’t truly hope if it came with the assurance of an eventual payoff, and putting it away felt like giving up. And she’d never been good at giving up.

And so she hoped—she hoped until she was out of breath, until she felt sick from it, until she couldn’t hear the murmurs whenever it got too quiet in her head, prompting doubts that were as much her own as anyone’s. She put the copper monocular on her nightstand, and tucked the old ledger into her bookcase. She wrapped the silk scarf around her hair, and wiped her eyes dry.

And then she went downstairs, and opened her bar for business.

 

 

_29._

 

Waiting had never been easy. It was manageable, and the doubt came in waves, ebbing and swelling like the tide. She’d have good days, where hope felt like conviction and where it seemed self-evident that he’d come back, and she’d have bad days, where she could barely remember what he’d told her, the day they’d parted—where she’d doubt if he really had kissed her that fiercely, or wonder if she’d imagined the things he’d said.

And it was difficult to keep holding out hope, when all she seemed to be doing was watch the people around her take their leave of her. Departures had never been easy on her heart, and she’d endured her share so far. First Shanks, then Ace, and now Luffy was due to follow.

Makino was beginning to wonder if she’d ever see any of them return.

“Do you have everything planned out?”

The grin he shot her was answer enough, even before Luffy chirped, “Nope! I’ll see how it goes, and I’ll only cross a bridge if I find it.”

Her smile didn’t manage to be convincingly reproachful. “Not exactly how that saying goes, but I suppose there’s some logic in it. One that’s uniquely yours.”

His grin persisted, seeming to find nothing amiss with that statement, and Makino sighed. “You’ll make me worry when you’re gone,” she told him. “You make me worry _now_ , and you haven’t even left yet.”

He scratched the back of his head, a gesture that was eerily reminiscent of his grandfather, and his grin took on a sheepish edge. “Ah—sorry.”

She shook her head. “Don’t be,” she told him. “It’s my job to worry. I’d do it no matter how prepared you were. Dadan would, too, although she’d probably put up a fight at the suggestion.”

Luffy’s smile eased across his face, before his expression changed, something she couldn’t quite read having come to settle in his features, no less animated than usual, although noticeably softer.

“Moms worry,” he said then, fiddling with a fraying thread on his shorts, and Makino promptly forgot every single thought in her head.

The openly earnest expression on his face almost hurt to look at, but, “Yeah,” she said, hoarsely. “They do that.”

“You and Dadan,” Luffy said then, shrugging his shoulders, before adding, like it was the easiest thing in the world, “I don’t have a mom, but I’d want you, if I could choose.” Then with a firm nod, as though to himself, “Both of you.”

She was crying, Makino realised. It seemed an oddly detached thought, at least compared to everything else she was feeling.

“You can,” she said then, making him look up. She saw his expression contorting with horror, but before he could voice his distress at the tears running down her cheeks, “You can choose," Makino said. "I wouldn’t mind. You’ve always been a little bit mine, anyway.” Then, with a laughing sob, “Although a good mother wouldn’t be sneaking you drinks before you were legal."

His grin was so wide it hurt her heart. “Nah. The _best_ mom would do that.”

She didn’t know if she was laughing or crying—if it even mattered which it was, her heart breaking and mending in the same breath.

“Oh, I’ve gotta go!” And with the same ease that he did everything, as though he hadn’t just swept her feet right from underneath her with a momentous declaration, Luffy sprang out of his seat. Bending half his body over the counter, he leaned forward to kiss her cheek loudly. “Happy birthday, Ma-chan!”

Then he was on his feet, and out her doors so fast he almost knocked over a chair, and nearly barrelled over Dadan in the process, his laughter drifting back when she shouted after him.

Watching him run, Dadan shook her head, before turning to Makino, still wiping her tears. But she didn’t ask, just said, “I thought he wasn’t leaving for another few months. The hell’s he in a hurry for? Not like the sea’s going anywhere in the meantime.”

Makino just shook her head. The parting kiss lingered on her cheek, the memory clinging, as defiant to being forgotten as the boy who’d given it. “He’s excited.”

Dadan snorted. “Must be nice.” Sweeping her gaze across the common room, she nodded to the bar. “You busy?”

“Just closing up,” Makino said, looking out across the empty room. The quiet Luffy had left seemed suddenly pervasive, and the chores she could perform in her sleep felt all at once like a greater effort than she had strength to give.

Dadan took a seat at the bar, easing her weight onto one of the stools as Makino fetched two glasses and a bottle. Brandy, this time. It felt like a night for brandy.

“One more year to go,” Dadan said, accepting her drink with a nod of thanks. “That’s what your agreement was, right? Ten years?”

“Yeah,” Makino said, hands worrying her own glass, the dark colour of the brandy swirling inside the polished crystal. She didn’t move to drink it.

“You’re not having doubts _now_?” Dadan asked, a note of incredulity slipping into her smoker’s rasp. “You’ve held out despite all that gossip for nine years, don’t tell me now’s the time you finally let it get to you?”

“That’s not what I’m doing,” Makino said, suddenly defensive. At Dadan’s arched brow, her shoulders sank a little. “Sometimes...I just wonder. It’s been so many years. I don’t even know if it was easier before—the waiting. I can’t remember.” She pressed her lips together, eyes lost in the brandy. “I can’t remember his voice,” she admitted quietly, her own breaking a little.

She remembered that she’d loved it, especially in the morning. She remembered that he had a slight accent that slipped out when he drank, but the sound of it eluded her grasp, slipped between her fingers when she reached for it.

“Time and distance will do that,” Dadan agreed, looking into her own glass, emptied of her drink. “Makes you forget things you take for granted. Voices. Faces.” She shrugged, the gesture stiff. “You spend years looking at it, watching it change, but the minute it’s out of reach, you forget.” She cleared her throat, her lips firming, and muttered under her breath, “You remember it had freckles, but can’t for a damn second remember more than that.”

Makino’s smile softened. “Worried about Ace?”

Dadan grumbled, and held out her glass for a refill. “The world should be the one worrying, with the amount of trouble that boy gets into before breakfast. And soon they’ll have Luffy to deal with. Honestly, I’m glad I’m well out of reach. Garp only has himself to thank for that headache.”

Putting the cork back into the bottle, Makino considered it, and the woman across the counter, her heavy-set shoulders and the veins of silver creeping into the copper curls spilling around them. The furrows of her face were deeper, the lines more pronounced, like the paunch above her belt. And it was easy keeping track of the years in boys who grew from sprigs to saplings, but the same years slipped her by on the faces of her friends. But Dadan was older, same as Makino.

She thought of Shanks again. She hadn’t seen his picture in the paper in a while, and wondered what he looked like now—wondered if there was silver in his hair, or if it was as red as it had always been. She wondered if he’d changed in other ways; if the sea had taken her due, and left him a different man than she remembered.

“You know, Garp might have news,” she said then, and didn’t know if she was speaking to Dadan or herself. “I could ask if he knows anything.”

Dadan waved her off. “I’d rather not know. Long as he’s safe, that’s all I need.”

Makino smiled. She considered the glass in her hands; the brandy she hadn’t touched. “He’ll come back,” she said.

She got a knowing look for that. “We still talking about Ace?” Dadan asked.

Makino shrugged. “Does it matter?”

Dadan snorted, but the corner of her mouth jutted. “Not really, although I have a feeling we’ll see Red-Hair back in these parts first. After all, he’s getting old—the world’s for the youngins. It’ll be a few more years before Ace comes back, I reckon, and don’t even get me started on Luffy.” She shook her head, but her expression betrayed her irritation. “Kids don’t think about the people they leave behind; they’re too busy living their own lives. It’s how it should be. Waiting is for the old.”

Makino lifted her glass. “Then here’s to waiting.”

Dadan knocked hers against it. “One more year.” She smiled. “Here’s hoping your thirtieth will be a good one, and with better company. I hear Red-Hair knows how to throw a party, but I’ve yet to see it.”

Makino laughed. And she would have protested the notion of better company if she hadn’t known it was teasingly meant. It might not have been all she’d wanted, but she’d never lacked in friends, or in company when she needed it. Her birthdays had been _celebrated_ , if each in its own way, and she’d been similarly loved, fiercely and uniquely.

Her heart sat a little lighter in her chest, and in that moment she didn’t feel all the years she’d put behind her, and all the departures she’d witnessed, and would witness yet. She didn’t think about the doubt that came and went with the tide, or the times she’d faltered in her conviction.

“One year,” she said, and with her grin kissed to the rim of the glass, downed her drink and _hoped_.

 

 

_30._

 

A lot can happen in one year.

It was a knowledge she’d always kept within her, intimately acquainted with how quickly the tides changed, on her quiet sea as easily as any other. It was the knowledge of having lived and loved and lost, and she knew not to take things for granted. She’d learned to treasure what she had, for however long she had it.

But even if she’d known that, nothing could have prepared her for what did happen, and the unforgiving truth that nothing, not all the stubborn hope in the world, would change the fact that there was a homecoming that would never take place.

Her thirtieth wasn’t a good birthday, or even a good day. There’d been a few well-wishers, but no one who’d lingered for a drink. She’d closed up early, taking her time with her small routines, with nothing else awaiting her but the remains of the day and her own company. Not usually a problem for her, but the years had made her greedy—had made her lonely, and craving company on a day that had always brought it, in one form or another.

He’d taught her to _want_ that, Makino realised—to be wanted, and loved. It wasn’t a desire that allowed itself to be forgotten, once it had first gotten comfortable.

And even if wanting company on her birthday wasn’t a selfish wish, it wasn’t a year for celebrating. A mood lay over the whole village, Ace’s execution still fresh in mind, an open wound several months old that showed few signs of healing, and even Makino was loath to drink to anything other than grief.

There’d been no news from abroad. She didn’t know where Garp was, or Luffy. The newspapers had little to say, the war over and forgotten a little more every day, the memory like a fading bruise. The world moved on, sometimes too fast for the ones left bereaved, but the sea didn’t pause for anything, least of all for death.

She hadn’t spoken to Dadan—hadn’t wanted to impose herself, or her selfish wishes, no matter how fierce the growing ache of loneliness within her, thinking about the long years behind her that separated her from the girl she’d been, and harder still, the long years ahead of her now, in the future that had never seemed more uncertain, even with their ten years come and gone and his old promise rising with her every morning from her empty bed, hoping still, even knowing better—even if the world had long since taught her better than to _hope_.

She spent her thirtieth birthday alone, drinking. One glass for the boy who’d never come back, one glass for the man who’d promised her he would, and one for herself, for the long years she’d held out hope, despite everything. The years she’d waited, and believed, hoping to drown the insecurities inching up her chest now, and the creeping silence of her empty bar, which always threatened to welcome the ghosts of old memories—of the birthday she’d spent with the captain she'd loved, and at the heart of a crew of pirates who’d treated her like that was exactly what she’d been.

 

—

 

It would take more than a year to heal that wound—would take more than a bottle to drown that sorrow, thinking of the boy who’d never come back, and the life that had barely had the chance to begin. And the years she’d put behind her seemed stolen now, thinking of how she’d spent them.

What changes had she wrought, in her little port? What difference had she made to anyone? She'd done nothing of worth but wait and hope, and what had hoping ever given her but grief?

 

—

 

It would take her a year to find the answer—the one she’d sought for a decade, and that she'd begun to lose hope she'd ever find.

But then, a lot can happen in one year.

 

 

_31._

 

She stirred at the tender kiss to her brow, but didn’t open her eyes, and felt his smile, the stretch of his lips heralding the low rumble of his voice, “Good morning, birthday girl.”

“ _No_ ,” she groaned, pressing her face into the pillow, the protest muffled. “No morning.”

She heard him laughing, the sound loud and without a single care for the early hour. “Not to argue specifics, but I don’t think that’s something you can deny. It’s morning whether you like it or not.”

Opening her eyes, Makino looked up at him, standing fully dressed at her bedside. “How are you awake this early?” she croaked. She hadn’t even heard him get up.

Shanks grinned, a warmly amused thing, and she pressed a hand over her eyes as he countered, “How are _you_ not awake yet? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you sleep in. Unless I’m somehow involved, and then it’s usually not sleeping you’re doing.” She could practically hear the grin widening as he added, dropping his voice to low timbre, “I’m up for being involved, though. Just say the word, and I’ll help you wake up.” Peering up through the slits of her fingers, she caught him wagging his brows. “You’ve already roused me, if you catch my drift.”

She tried to toss the pillow at him, but he evaded with infuriating grace, and more laughter as she fumbled, half-trapped between the sheets and encumbered by the sheer size of her eight-month pregnant stomach. She attempted a glare when his mirth persisted, but it was difficult holding on to her irritation when he was beaming at her like that.

Running a hand through her hair, she rubbed at her eyes. “Our child was up all night, and so I was up all night,” she said, spreading her fingers over the curve of her stomach. She felt the baby shift, but couldn’t decide if it felt like sympathy or cheeky agreement.

Shanks’ grin was easier to decipher. Makino watched as he ducked his head, her smile quirking at the kiss pressed to her stomach. The light scrape of his beard along the exposed slip of skin made her shiver. “Hey, minnow. Give your mom a break. She’s got a birthday to celebrate.”

Looking up at her through his lashes, her smile slipped at the sight of the grin he shot her, and, “What have you planned?” she asked, warily.

“So suspicious,” Shanks laughed, with another kiss to her belly, before reaching for her hand. “But I'm not telling. Come on. Up you get.”

She groaned, and tried to drag the second pillow over her head, when he stole it. “Shanks," she whined, and didn't care that it sounded petulant. "I’m too pregnant for this.”

The look he gave her was far too innocent. “The guys are so excited,” he told her, with an infuriatingly convincing pout. “You’ll break their hearts.”

Makino looked at him standing above her, his expression wholly expectant. Her surrender came with a sigh. “That’s not fair,” she mumbled, as he reached down to tuck his nose beneath her ear, his laughter warm where it ghosted across her skin.

“I don’t play fair,” Shanks purred, mouthing a kiss to her neck. “Not that you’re any better, looking like this. You’re distractingly gorgeous.”

“What,” she laughed thickly, rubbing at her eyes, “profoundly pregnant and unkempt?”

“Yes,” he said, without even a pause for breath, before leaning down to kiss her. She felt his grin, and the words murmured against her mouth as he pressed a large hand to her belly, smoothing it reverently over the full curve, “It’s almost enough to make me forget what I came up here for.”

She hummed, sinking into the kiss when his hand left her stomach to cradle the back of her neck. She played with the hair at his nape, a gentle tug asking him to come closer. “ _Almost_ enough?”

“ _Ha_ ,” he breathed, the sound rough, and she could see the effect she was having when she dropped her eyes between them. “Wily girl,” he named her with a firm kiss, before extracting himself from her reaching hands, although not without planting another kiss to her stomach.

Still tired and now uncomfortably aroused, Makino was about to ask what he needed her for so badly that he couldn’t even sneak in a quickie, when Shanks tossed a shirt at her head, cutting her question in half, and laughed when she pulled it off, glaring through the unruly curtain of her hair.

She was about to tell him what she thought of his cheek so early in the morning when she noticed the sunlight creeping through the slit in the curtains. She blinked, then croaked, startled, “The sun is up.”

“Very astute observation, my heart. You’d make an excellent sailor. Put my navigator out of a job.”

Ignoring the breezy quip, she shook her head, realisation catching up with her, along with the fact that she'd slept in, and _late_. No wonder he'd been surprised. “Wait—who opened the bar?”

Shanks made a sweeping gesture to himself. “That would be me, the dashing rogue otherwise known as your husband.” He leaned down, and taking the shirt from her slack fingers, made to pull it over her head.

“ _You_ opened the bar?” she asked, slipping her hands into the sleeves when he gave each a nudge.

“She sounds so dubious,” Shanks said, to their unborn child where it kicked in her belly, his nose pressed just beneath her ribcage. “Your mother has no faith in me.” At her look, he flashed her a grin, his look affectionately enduring. “Your bar is open for business. I wiped down the tables, and stacked the glasses at exactly the angle you like. I checked on your shipment—Ben did inventory, because apparently my handwriting offends everything he holds sacred—and everything has gone smoothly. There was a _minor_ fire, but we got it under control.”

At her gaping, he smiled. “I was joking about the fire,” he told her. “Oh, and I wore an apron and everything. I looked really good in it, too. I took it off before coming up here, because I had explicit orders to bring you back down in a timely fashion, and if you saw me in it, well…” He raised his brows, and when she laughed, caught her mouth in a kiss.

Drawing back, she watched him take her in, and given her state, thought she should have fretted under the attention, but the look on his face made it curiously easy to forget how she must look.

He thumbed the anchor nestled at the heart of her throat. “I have a better gift for you this year,” Shanks said—the closest he’d ever come to laying claim to the giving, and Makino smiled.

“It’s not a ship, is it?”

“Why, would you like one?”

She stuck her tongue out, before her smile followed, and there was no teasing in her voice when she told him, quietly, “I have everything I need.”

She felt his hand as it came to rest over her stomach, his rough palm huge where it spanned the curve of it easily. The significance wasn’t lost, and she watched as he gave chase to the movement under her skin.

“Not even a tiny sloop?” he asked then, lifting his eyes back to hers, his smile eager—enough that she believed him fully capable of making it happen. “One that's pretty, like you—all sleek timbers and dainty curves.”

Her snort was soft. “Lovely imagery, but right now I feel more like a freighter,” Makino said, and the laugh that ripped from him was so loud she forgot she was tired.

Her heart felt light—felt full, the sensation wonderfully contradictory, and she couldn’t keep the smile off her face as Shanks made to hunt down more for her to wear. And coming fully awake, Makino watched him as he moved about, muttering under his breath about paying more attention to where her clothes disappeared when he took them off her. The sunlight caught in his hair, still too red to believe, even as she’d searched out the silver hidden in it. His shirt was loose, a lovely deep blue that she’d sewn herself, and she wrinkled her nose with a smile at the pattern on his shorts, seeming chosen for no other reason than cheerful impudence.

“Shanks,” she said, worrying the fabric of her shirt, before lacing her fingers over her stomach, large and round under her palms. Their baby had settled, and she stroked her fingers tenderly over the curve. “Thank you.”

He turned, his smile small and bemused. “What for?”

 _For this_ , she wanted to say, watching him standing in her bedroom—the room that resisted the notion that it was just hers now, and in small ways; one of his shirts hanging over the back of the chair, and the folded razor on her vanity. The wire-rimmed reading glasses on her nightstand, and the logbook shoved behind one of the pillows. A rogue sandal, its partner missing, a wonderfully endearing _mess_ that left her short of breath.

But that didn’t even begin to describe what she felt, and so _for coming back_ , she wanted to add, listening to the laughter drifting up from downstairs, and feeling the little movements of their unborn child within her, pushing up under her hands; an arrival that didn't first start with a departure, the gift of that new life felt like the greatest she'd ever been given.

There was a lot she could have told him, all the words she'd hoarded, treasures in their own right, but she thought then, of that birthday so long ago, and the ones that had followed—the girl who’d grown up making herself sparse in everything, who’d grown bolder, who’d learned to want, and to recognise that she was someone to want, and someone to choose.

“For making me feel like someone worth celebrating,” Makino said quietly, and watched his smile soften, bemusement warming into understanding. It deepened the lines at the corners of his eyes, his face older, harder but still achingly handsome, and the affection in it palpable, as Shanks reached down to kiss the top of her head.

“Oh, my girl,” he said, the endearment old and hers, but she heard in it more than just the years behind them—heard the numberless years still ahead of them as he grinned, and promised her—

“You haven't seen anything yet.”

 


End file.
